/lit/ - Literature

Here's what I think.

>other entertainment, tv, games, internet, etc.
>other media is less demanding...or not demanding at all
>book stores are scary for non-readers, like gyms and nightclubs are scary for forever alones
>books over 500 pages (lol, doorstoppers)
>readers themselves, and how they (sometimes) make fun or non-readers

Green text is pretty. I want everything to be pretty.

>implying Sunhawk threads are worth anything

>>1973671

White people problems? More like WASP problems.

And JD Salinger was a fucking badass, one of the best writers of all time. I think the reason a lot of people don't like Salinger is because they've only read Catcher. I didn't like it either. Nine Stories and RHTRBCASAI are good, Franny and Zooey is very good.

Can we talk about literature, please? I want to talk about it a bit.

Hello Capsguy. Sigh.

Infinite Jest is alright, but massively overrated. Listen to me. The whole thing is extremely repetitive. It's just the same 2 chapters over and over and over and over again. When Ayn Rand did this, people went crazy. When DFW did it, OMG THIS ROX! I think that both authors were preachy and repetitive, if anything. The drug chapters were enjoyable for about 300 pages, maybe more, then I realised I would have another 700 fucking pages of exposition about drug rehab, a lot of it the same ideas repeated, and that wasn't good. The tennis chapters get boring by the end as well.

Look, if you want something very good by the author, read Oblivion: Stories or Girl With Curious Hair. The Pale King is a unique, good read, too.

BEST

The Wastelands
Song of Sussanah
The Drawing of the Three
Wizard and Glass
Wolves of the Calla
Dark Tower VII
The Gunslinger

WORST

Such a great series, isn't it! I find myself rereading bits of it from time to time, and it only took about 6 months to read all the way through the first time.

I mostly agree with what other people say, about how the series started off good, then lost it for the last 3 books, although I did enjoy SoS a lot, because I like Eddie and Susannah. The Gunslinger and WaG are love / hate books, dividing fans. I'm surprised I haven't seena Dark Tower thread on /lit/ in a while, unless I missed it.

>>1972194

You hate every single one of the 12 writers, Anonymous? Haters gonna hate. You didn't even follow up with justification for it.

>>1972165

I have come to the end of my Murakami reading, since I've finished all his English books. :( Thankfully though, 1Q84 will be out in October, and they'll be another book in a couple of years.

>>1972143

Hehe. Wow. I can't believe people thought I was serious. This is the Chosen Book of this board. They never shut up about it. I was just preying on the naivety of our friend.

IMO, the book is average. Overwrought, extremely repetitive, and boring. Having said that, some sections were great, and I like postmodernism in general.

JD Salinger
Orson Scott Card
Isaac Asimov
Margaret Atwood
Richard Yates
Jonathan Franzen
David Foster Wallace
Mario Vargas Llosa
Roberto Bolano
Haruki Makumari
Kazuo Ishirugo
Isabel Allende

All good and great authors. I don't know how to feel about this, though. I OFTEN feel I read the same people too much, but I get nervous when reading new novelists. Many of them I don't like, and never read again.

Who comprises your main core of reading? Or do you prefer to read lots of different writers?What do you think of my own core?

>>1972129

Because we think it's so badly written, and irrelevant, and most of all, we can't stand David Foster Wallace. Yeah. We think that book is only for hipsters.

Well, now. This board hates Infinite Jest, so don't mention it to them.

Second Foundation, Isaac Asimov.

Such an amazing book. Great prose, great plot, very good characters. The first 80 pages are close to perfect.

>>1971910

url plz

>>1971893

Yeah, it represents his work fairly well, and is probably my favourite by him. Then read Revolutionary Road, and maybe all his other works.

>>1971601

I didn't know /lit/ had an ongoing chat room. I thought it was just made from time to time. I've been there before, it's decent, soft of. Oh yeah.

>>1971537

They were annoying, but (most) made me laugh, especially the more realistic ones. Did anyone make an archive? I'd kill to look through it. So many reidiculous scenarios that almost certainly didn't happen.

>>1971526

I think so. I can't even remember if /lit/ likes Yates or not, or has read him. He makes John Updike look like a neckbeard.

I read his whole body of work this year, and now I'm rereading The Easter Parade, which was my favourite. It's not quite as enjoyable as I remember it being, but still a good book, certainly. Hardly any boring pages on it, even if it is slim.

As a writer, he only had a few major problems:

1. All his books basically the same, especially the style of the dialogue. The guys are angry and swear all the time, the girls are passive and weak.
2. He uses too much dialogue.
3. His books a little too short, but this isn't that big a deal.

I think of him as like a old-time Franzen, Atwood or Munro (but better than Munro, the hackette).

>>1971177

Made me laugh out loud.

I've started to like Pynchon ever since Against The Day, whereas previously I couldn't stand him. How is Mason and Dixon? I know a lot of people consider it his best work. Please give me a few details about it, prose, characters, plot, etc.

Chapter type rankings...

1. Social chapters, i.e. he and his 3 friends at expensive restaurants and wearing nice clothes
2. Sexual chapters
3. Torture chapters
4. Music chapters

I thought the bits where he and his friends are having shallow conversations were the best. The sexual and torture chapters were okay, but got too explicit and stomach churning towards the end. The music chapters were dull, but only because A. I didn't recognise much of the music, and B. they were out of place.

A good book though. Porbably the author's best work.

No. See picture.

Guess they didn't have anything to say to that. It may've been a samefag, anyway.